Rali attended the University of Maine at Farmington (UMF).   In 1987, she earned a B.S. in Special Education: Emotional Disturbance with minors in Elementary Education and English, and she was chosen as the speaker for graduation in part because she was so well known on campus from her time working in the cafeteria, her radio show on WUMF, and running the Big Brother Big Sister program. Following graduation, from 1987- 2000, Rali was employed as a special education teacher working with children from preschool through high school who struggled with learning and emotional differences.  During that time, Rali was actively involved in her UU Church in Portland, ME, teaching Sunday school, hosting coffee hours, and ushering. During this time, Rali was involved in several human rights and environmental action groups, including get-out-the-vote campaigns, Stop Clear Cutting in Maine, and Pro-Choice campaigns. 

 

From 2000 to 2003, Rali attended Bangor Theological Seminary. She started a house cleaning business to put herself through seminary. Rali also completed her field study at First Parish in Portland, Maine, where she was actively involved in Maine Interfaith Power and Light, which worked to bring sustainable power to Maine and encourage the use of LED bulbs and alternatives to fossil fuels. Rali completed a year of Clinical Pastoral Education at Maine Medical Center.  In Rali’s final year of seminary, she was the subject of a SALT Magazine story titled Pew to Pulpit by Susan Baxter. Upon graduation from seminary, Rali was invited to San Francisco for a year-long internship under the Rev. John Newcomb Marsh. While in San Francisco, Rev. Weaver was actively involved in standing against the death penalty and began visits with Jack Williams, a wrongly convicted young man on death row with whom she continues to correspond to this day.  At the end of Rali’s internship year, she was hired as the Interim Director of Lifelong Learning. Rali revived the children's and adults' religious education offerings, taught classes on understanding neurodivergence, and helped manage the afterschool program for homeless youth. 

 

In 2004, the Rev Rali M. Weaver passed the Minister Fellowship Committee and was invited to King’s Chapel as the Assistant Minister under the Rev. Earl K. Holt.  The Rev. Rali M. Weaver was ordained at King’s Chapel in March 2005.  At King’s Chapel, the Rev Rali M. Weaver assisted with all aspects of worship and pastoral care, oversaw the children’s and adults' religious education, and led the children’s chapel. King’s Chapel was in a period of discernment, and Rev. Weaver assisted the committee in working with an outside consultant to create a long-range plan. 

 

In May 2007, Rali was called to the First Church and Parish in Dedham as its first female Parish Minister in its 369-year history. During her time here, Rev. Weaver revived our congregational life and helped us focus less on fundraising and more on service to the community. In her second year, UU World named Dedham one of the fastest-growing UU Congregations.   

 

In 2008, Rev. Weaver finished her final fellowship with the UUA. She supervised three ministerial students during her tenure: the Rev. Seth Carrier Ladd, the Rev. Kevin Carson, and the Rev. Donna Dolham. All three went on to serve congregations and the denomination.

 

In her time in Dedham, Rev. Weaver encouraged collaborative relationships with AIDS Rides, Dedham Shines, Stop the Pipeline in Dedham, Bikes Not Bombs, Cradles to Crayons, the Dedham Artist Guild, Bay State Learning Collaborative, Star Path Montessori, and the Dedham School of Music.  During her years as our minister, Rali also served on the Mass Bay District Ministers Committee, The Chickering Foundation, Sophia Snow Place, Dedham Food Pantry, Dedham Refugee Collaborative, Mass Convention of Congregational Ministers, Christian Clergy in the UUA, and the Boston Minister’s Club. 

 

Rev. Weaver is responsible for starting an annual February Justice Matinee Film Series, encouraging community conversations on issues ranging from Black Lives Matter to Women’s Rights, Climate Change, and Immigration. She also offered a yearly sermon series during Black History Month, raising awareness of Black History that had long been forgotten and encouraging our congregation to examine its whiteness through discussions, readings, and reflection.

 

In 2015, Rev. Weaver organized several trainings in nonviolent resistance at First Church and was arrested twice for disturbing the peace charges related to active attempts to register descent to the Spectra Natural Gas Pipeline that runs through Dedham’s Gonzalas Field. In 2017, Rali helped facilitate the petition signing and discussions that led to Dedham's final adoption of a Human Rights Commission and actively participated in planning and organizing the first MLK Day community event in Dedham.  

 

In her tenure, Rali also decorated thousands of paper mache eggs for our yearly easter egg hunt. During the pandemic, Rali organized a reverse easter egg hunt, during which hundreds of eggs were delivered to the front doors of quarantined parishioners. She also established and ran our live streaming and YouTube during COVID-19. Rev. Weaver’s focus on professionalism, collaboration, marketing, and connection through the use of technology helped us move through the pandemic and assisted our transition into an increasingly digital age.

 

In her eighteen years serving the Dedham Church, Rali earned three sabbaticals. First, she took part-time (one week a semester and five to six days per month to study over three years) to work on her PhD in Transformative Studies at the California Institute of Integral Studies, where she studied issues related to church vitality until she could no longer afford the time and commitment to finish her dissertation.  On her second sabbatical, she traveled back and forth from Connecticut every other week for six months to care for family members in crisis.  Rev. Weaver took her final sabbatical in 2023 with her wife, Jenny Carlson-Pietraszek, just as they became empty nesters. They traveled the world and shared their journey with the congregation through blogging and social media.  Upon her return to serving our community, Rev. Weaver completed her first-level training in Internal Family Systems Therapy to augment her ministerial counseling skillset. 

 

While minister in Dedham, the Rev. Rali M. Weaver strove to help the wider UU Community by offering pastoral support and education for several other congregations, including The First Church in Jamaica Plain, First Parish Milton, and First Parish Needham. The Rev. Weaver was also the sabbatical minister at King’s Chapel from July to August 2019 and served as the Denominational Counselor to UU Students at Harvard from 2019-2021. In June of 2024, Rali was approached by the Falmouth UU Fellowship (UU Falmouth) to help them as a part-time contract minister. She helped Dedham and Falmouth throughout the 2024-2025 church year, acknowledging that “no minister can serve one congregation forever.” She actively strove to sunset her ministry with grace and dignity and, as her mother always taught her, “to leave a place better than you found it.”  Rev. Rali Weaver resigned from her minister post effective June of 2025 to pursue a full-time call at UUFalmouth.